


Virtual Mind Swap

by Old Mythical Beast (OldMythicalBeastOfColor)



Category: Rhett & Link
Genre: "I would die for you", Alien Invasion, Alien probing, Apocalyptic Journal, Friendship, Gen, Grandchildren, Link discovers a secret, MerRhett, Mind reading/telepathy, Mpreg, Peril, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Science Fiction, Simulation, Virtual Reality, Zombies, all the prompts, but there's chapter breaks kinda, implied major character death simulated, it's pretty long for a one-shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-18
Updated: 2018-02-18
Packaged: 2019-03-20 16:48:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13721898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OldMythicalBeastOfColor/pseuds/Old%20Mythical%20Beast
Summary: "We know we are in a simulation!"In the not-too-distant future, the guys hack some virtual reality helmets to simultaneously explore the landscapes of each other's subconscious minds.For Science! (-Fiction)Originally written in October 2017 forhttps://scarystoriestotellintherhink.tumblr.com/Using ALL of that week's prompts





	Virtual Mind Swap

**Author's Note:**

> Do not be alarmed: this is just a simulation. No actual fictionalized characters were harmed or abused in any way.

***************************  
1/5 Into the Simulation  
***************************  
"Begin Recording."

Rhett:  
"In our search for new ideas for creative content, we've re-wired two brand-new Waking Dream Virtual Reality helmets to feed into one another."

Link:  
"So instead of consciously exploring our own dream-worlds, I'll see VR images created by his brain-waves, while he sees images created by mine."

R:  
"In effect, we're using this new technology to simultaneously explore one another's inmost thoughts, possibly discovering ideas that are secret even to ourselves."

L:  
"That's exactly what I just said."

R:  
"While these things are running, which should be for just about 10 minutes, we'll each describe and record our own experience, telling the other guy what we're seeing in their head... so we can both find out what might be going on in there."

L:  
"Definitely do not try this at home."

R:  
"Yeah, not even with someone you think you know pretty well."

L:  
"And definitely not with anyone you don't trust completely."

R:  
"And never rewire delicate high-tech equipment like we did here, even if you are a professional comedian, unless you also have an engineering degree-"

L:  
"-like we do, although neither of us studied Electrical Engineering. Or Neuroscience."

R:  
"We may never make this public, but at least we'll see if we can still learn something new about each other after all these years!"

L:  
"Hopefully we'll see something weird enough to spur us on to our next great creative thing."

R & L together:  
"5-4-3-2-1..."  
(In unison)  
"Here we go!"

***************************  
Rhett voiceover:  
"Even though we both know we're really sitting next to each other on the couch in our brainstorming cabin, we find ourselves standing in a bright clearing in an old forest, casually holding hands and looking around. This must be the standard intro setting, identical for everyone."

From nowhere and everywhere, a rich, soothing, feminine voice tells us: "Welcome to the VR world of Waking Dream. This is a simulation of your inner mind, where you can safely and consciously explore the landscape of your own subconscious.   
Warning: What you will see and experience are neither your actual memories nor your conscious desires. Do not be alarmed. This is only a simulation, extrapolated from signals from the same part of your brain that creates your dreams during REM sleep.   
You have chosen voice activated settings: say 'pause, save, resume, restart, skip to next, or exit program' to perform those functions.   
You have chosen to explore five scenarios: Creation; Destruction; Fantasy; Future; and Death. Do not be alarmed:  
You will not be harmed in any way.  
You have set each exploration zone's time limit for... two minutes.   
This elapsed time, as you experience it, may appear longer or shorter to you, depending on conditions and your own individual responses.  
This is a simulation based on your brainwave signals. You have chosen to signal zone changes with the following stimuli: sound of... chiming bell; and smell of... roses.   
Please relax. Nothing here is real.  
Now, please practice controlling the movements of your mental avatar: right hand, left hand... no, your other left hand... right foot, left foot, walk forward, turn clockwise; clockwise; meaning, to pivot in a circle towards your right.  
Very good, thank you.   
Relax. This is only a simulation.  
Program begins... now."

***************************  
2/5 Creation and Destruction  
***************************  
CREATION

"Continue recording."

Link (Talking to Rhett, from inside the simulation of Rhett's mind):  
"I don't think this set-up was designed to be used like this, but so far, so good. We're still together, in the forest clearing. The voice-over introduction has stopped, and I think we should try to meet the person we heard talking: she sounded really interesting. Now there's music starting. It isn't anything I've heard before- it must be one of your latest song ideas, taking on real actual shape, becoming floating solid sculptures right in front of us. You told me once how you visualize different notes and tones with different shapes and colors... now I see it too! Man, this is so cool. Let's see what we can build!"

Rhett (Talking to Link, from inside the simulation of Link's mind):  
"There's that tune that I've been messing around with this week, taking form, literally, out of the thin air right in front of us. All the shapes look exactly right, but I could use your help fitting them together. You've started whistling along, adding some harmony, and new shapes are instantly appearing, floating alongside my old ones. We both grab pieces and start building a fantastical structure: it reminds me a little of the brainstorming cabin where we really are this week, out there in the real world, if that cabin were a bouncy castle built of music. It's just about finished and I see you reach for the front door, and as you go in a bell chimes and I smell roses."

***************************  
DESTRUCTION

Link (Talking to Rhett, from inside the simulation of Rhett's mind):  
"I open the door and at first I see a maze, then I smell roses and a bell chimes and suddenly I'm outdoors again, but in a besieged city with skyscrapers being torn apart by enormous sentient plants, while it's also getting attacked by giant chickens, cows, and pigs... there's a huge evil Ghost Pepper breathing fire... The sky is filled with spaceships... and where are you? Oh, You're right by me, we're riding away from the monsters on the bikes we had as kids, racing away from the destruction. I ask you what the heck's going on, since this is your imagination, not mine. You're telling me how aliens invaded and then they somehow re-animated and combined the life-forces of everything we've ever eaten, and now all our food is wreaking vengeance on us. Like, every bit of pork we've ever eaten has now become that ginormous monster pig over there, and there's some crazy-looking monsters because we've eaten a lot of weird stuff! I smell roses and we jump off our bikes: I hear a bell chime just as we lift up a manhole cover and jump down into the darkness..."

Rhett (Talking to Link, from inside the simulation of Link's mind):  
"I follow you into the cabin but we are immediately outside in the woods again, except it feels really different, like the world is somehow almost completely empty. Everyone and everything is gone, except for us and except for something evil which is hunting us. You start explaining how we mistakenly got left behind in the Rapture, which is strange because I know you never even read that book series. Then we start running and I see what's chasing us: It's the zombie milkmaids from that one silly movie poster! They look a lot like me but they're not me: they're chasing us both, waving knives and brain buckets, and I'm right next to you and we make it to the cabin and open the door, and I smell roses and a bell chimes and... "

***************************  
3/5 Fantasy  
***************************  
FANTASY

Rhett continues (Talking to Link, from inside the simulation of Link's mind):  
"...we're inside a spaceship.   
The curving metal walls have portholes with a view of the nearby Earth... where are you now? It's a red-lit labyrinth of curving metal corridors, I finally find a door, it leads into a medical-looking room with sloping exam tables and robotic torture devices hanging from the ceiling. There are grey-green aliens wearing lab coats and rubber gloves and- I found you! They've got you, and oh gosh, you're completely naked and strapped down onto an exam table, wearing nothing but a blindfold, with your legs raised and your feet strapped into stirrups and, oh, gosh, you're getting probed, but you seem like, uh, you seem to be enjoying it, like, a lot, and I'm backing away, but the alien doctor turns and looks at me and suddenly I'm the alien doctor, and I turn back towards you and... I smell roses and a bell chimes..."

Link (Talking to Rhett, from inside the simulation of Rhett's mind):  
"We jumped down into the darkness but now everything is suffused in a bluish-green light. Apparently we are underwater, but it doesn't feel wet, just kind of weightless, and we're breathing normally without any kind of special gear. Now you're up ahead of me, inside an intricate underwater structure, a house built of living coral and seaweed. I can see you through the round windows, but not very well. I swim inside through a big pearly archway and say, 'Hi honey, I'm home!' You turn toward me, and I notice you are a mer-person, and gosh, you're radiantly beautiful, with sparkly golden skin and bright green floaty hair and a pretty green beard that perfectly matches your great green tail and fins, and you have, uh, very ample, uh, seashells, and you're way more than halfway pregnant. Seriously, dude? I gotta say you look great, though. You give me a big smile and say 'Take off your hat indoors!' So I take it off and I see that it's a crown, which I hang by the door, on a hook right next to your crown. I look down to see what color fins I have, but I'm not a mer-person like you: the whole bottom half of my body is a giant serpent, with a diamond pattern of blue, black, and purple scales. Oh right, I get it, I'm the Serpent King, and you're swimming over to me to welcome me home with a big kiss but as you get closer I smell roses and a bell chimes."

***************************  
4/5 Future and Death  
***************************  
FUTURE

Rhett (Talking to Link, from inside the simulation of Link's mind):  
"We're out at the park, playing ball with our families, but our families include a whole bunch of people I've never seen in real life: it's all our grandkids together with their kids. Right now, I know exactly who they all are, because of course I do. I toss the ball to one of the twins, and I look up at you to see how old age is treating you. You look pretty good, you've got a short grey beard now, and you've got your silver hair in two long braids. I can tell I have a big bushy beard, but I can't tell whether or not I still have the rest of my hair. I reach up to feel the top of my head, and it's really smooth- exactly like the top of the VR helmet I'm wearing in real life, so I don't know what that means. You look at me and say- 'why are you looking for hairs when you're surrounded by heirs?' And you laugh at your own joke while one of the kids brings me a big fragrant red rose and a bell chimes."

Link (Talking to Rhett, from inside the simulation of Rhett's mind):  
"So here we are now in one of your ideas about the future. I have to hand it to you, this is way cooler than anything I can describe. Right now we are touring the solar system as data packets, traveling on beams of light. What I mean is, somehow our consciousnesses have been digitized in a way that allows us to experience speed-of-light travel with no physical limitations. It's us, but it's not us. Like we're simulations of ourselves, but those simulations are really experiencing space travel and seeing real places in real time. Sorry I can't do it justice, but this is all from your brain, so really, I don't have to try to describe it to you, do I? It looks and feels amazing, flying between planets and moons, seeing stars... (silence) ...and there's... wow... (longer silence) Did I hear a bell? Oh crap, it's over already.

***************************  
DEATH

Link continues (Talking to Rhett, from inside the simulation of Rhett's mind):  
"...We've landed back on earth, on an old highway between cornfields. We're walking along, looking for a bus stop- there it is, on the other side of the road. Why does it feel like we're in a movie? Oh, it's because everything is in black and white. You look really nervous for some reason, like you know what's about to happen, but I don't, I'm sorry, I haven't seen this movie. We both notice an old-fashioned plane dusting crops, except it isn't now, it's suddenly flying towards us. What the heck, man, it's shooting at us! You grab my hand and we start running and we're going to get strafed with bullets but we run into the cornfield and you throw yourself down on top of me and I'm completely immobilized by your sheer size and weight, and I hear the plane and the bullets and you're shielding me like you've practiced this move our whole lives and I can't move. The plane flies away and you still don't move... Don't say it, man, don't say it, it never was funny... Oh God, No, say something, say something, No... " (sobbing) (silence)  
(End Recording One)

***************************  
5/5 Death and Beyond  
***************************  
(Recording Two Continues)  
Rhett (Talking to Link, from inside the simulation of Link's mind):  
"We've been walking through a maze, and it looks like we've finally found the way out. But there's a wide river between us and the exit door.  
'Hello!'  
We hear the same voice from the intro, but this time, we turn and see the speaker: it's a statuesque black lady wearing khakis with a white polo shirt, sitting at a desk with a very fancy computer. She's smiling at us.  
'Do you want me to save your avatar before you exit the program? This is just a simulation, and if you try to cross that without saving' - she points at the river- 'You could lose everything permanently.'  
'Yes, of course,' you say, 'save it please.'  
But I ask her, 'No offense, but why should I believe you?'  
'You don't have to believe me at all, but I did build the code behind all this,' she waves to indicate everything.  
'And if you want to make it to that exit door, just ask, and I'll show you out safely.'  
She looks smart and in charge so I think we can trust her. 'Okay,' I say, 'Please save my avatar and show us the best way out.'  
She quickly types some things into her computer, and something shimmers in the air over the river between us and the door. She gets up and walks to the riverbank.  
'Follow me,' she says, and we do. In every place she steps, part of a bridge appears right under her feet. We follow her closely, all the way to the door. We say 'Thank you!' but she's already gone, and we jump through the door before the bridge disappears too. The door, behind us now, has become a pearly archway decorated with bright flowers, and we're both wearing white tuxes, like we're dressed for a wedding. There seems to be confetti in the air as well as floating musical shapes, in colors I have never seen. The flowers smell like roses, and one of the musical tones is a chiming bell, and we're..."

***************************  
Rhett continues:  
"...back in the clearing in the forest, and we're both crying, and then we hear the lady's voice again:   
'End program. Relax: Do not be alarmed. This has been a simulation. Please close your eyes and remove your Waking Dream Virtual Reality helmet now.'  
It's finished, and we're taking off our helmets and looking at each other in real life."

Rhett and Link together:  
"Okay, well... let's talk about that."

(End Recording Two)

FIN


End file.
